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Text Box: For the men who witnessed unspeakable acts and spent many years of their young adult lives deeply entrenched in combat, Saturday's dedication of a local World War II memorial was long overdue. "Too many years had to go by," said Bill Lester. "I think it was well overdue -- long overdue." "The longer you get from any event, the memory starts to fade. This one was the big one, and kids are not getting that history. Pretty soon we will all be gone, and where will they get the truth from?" he added. Lester, along with dozens of other World War II veterans, lined the grassy knoll in front of the 18-foot memorial monument and listened intently as their historic acts of bravery were formally acknowledged by their community. "It demoralizes you," said veteran Victor Rawlins, 81. "We gave so much without so much as a second thought about it, but it took years before it was recognized. Too many young boys lost their lives over there. They went over as boys and died as men." Lester, who spent three years in the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific with the 92nd Division of the 23rd Infantry, said he was not prepared for the life of a soldier when he left at the age of 19 but accepted it was part of his American duty. "I didn't really know where I was going or what I was going to do," he said. "At that time in my mind, there was a great pride to go into the armed forces. You felt something must be wrong with you if you didn't go to the army." That sense of civic responsibility continued throughout his tour of duty, although Lester was placed in a segregated unit that did not see a lot of face-to-face combat. "I was proud to serve, but unfortunately the role that me and others like me -- black soldiers -- were placed in meant we didn't have much of a chance to see combat," he said. For Eugene Vining, combat was all he saw for 10 months while he cleared Japanese troops from China, Burma and India. As an 18-year-old man, he said it was not the orders that haunt him but what was left on the battlefield as a result. "It saddens me to think there are still soldiers in the Himalayan Mountains who will never be retrieved," he said. However, finally seeing the community memorial has softened his disposition. "The monument itself is a nice thing," he said. "It can be added to from year to year and new things can be added as they are found. We'll pass and be forgotten like the rest, but the monument will live on forever." The memories of that time are not forgotten for Cecil Rinehart, who served about eight months in the South Pacific as a member of the 3rd Engineer Combat Battalion. Particularly vivid are the images of Hiroshima, Japan, the first victim in history of an atomic bomb. "It was completely demolished," he said about his position in Japan in 1946 during the U.S. occupation. "There was nothing left standing after Hiroshima. It was like someone took those buildings and just crushed them." Rinehart said as a young 20-year-old, those images will forever be branded into his memory along with the faces of the men who were not able to return to the states and tell their stories. "Just sitting here makes you think of all the men who couldn't be here," he said from inside the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 108 with a group of fellow veterans. (Roberson can be reached at 772-9376 or via e-mail at lroberso@nncogannett.com) Originally published Sunday, September 12, 2004

Text Box: 'Overdue' monument pays tribute to troops' story— Event helps WWII vets recall life as a soldier By LISA ROBERSON Gazette Staff Writer